Blog of a course that allows students to learn how to use books, newspapers, magazines, journals, archives, databases, and the Internet to find and evaluate information on legendary creatures such as Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, and other cryptids. It also encourages the developement of critical thinking skills to deal with extraordinary claims and ideas for thinking about them.

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Nessie!

Most articles that I have found tend to be geared towards young adults/children more than actual scientific news. Although I have been able to find good information about Nessie, there is some digging that needs to be done in order to find the information. An article that I found recently is from boy’s life magazine, while this article is for young boys there is still a plethora of information on Nessie that anyone can use. The article titled “Mysterious Loch Ness Monster,” tackles the issue of Nessie being a real sea monster or a hoax that is put into place to lure tourism into Scotland. This article, complete with many pictures/drawings of Nessie that are quite ominous, really tries to explain what Nessie could be. The article describes Nessie’s home, Loch Ness, as 24 miles long, up to 980 feet deep and the water stays chilly all year long. This Loch is what many Nessie followers use as there main argument as to why Nessie exists. This article states that there has been an increase of followers since 1930 because the town surrounding the Loch expanded and many followers flocked to the town to see the famous Nessie.

Now tourists spend millions of dollars on hotels, shops, and restaurants, leading many people to believe that the myth of Nessie is just perpetuated because the town wants money from tourism. The “Mysterious Loch Ness Monster” leaves the opinion of what Nessie really is to the reader, which is nice because they do not put their own opinions onto the reader. Nessie in this article can be either one of the best-unknown creatures out there or the best hoax that a country can put on. I believe that this article is credible because they clearly did the research about Nessie and what is and is not true. Also the authors put time and effort in creating an article that presents all of the facts and the reader can become a huge Nessie fan or a skeptic of the monster. The only issue that I had with this article is that they did not explain enough of why and how this would be a hoax. If more info about that part of the binary were present, it would help readers make a more informed decision about what they choose to believe. This was a fun read and the pictures made the articles seem even more amazing because they are well drawn and provide a good background to see what Nessie could look like. Overall this article, written for young boys, is a well-done piece that provides the basic information about the Nessie controversy.